Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great (600 BC-530 BC) was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire and the King of Persia from 559 BC to 530 BC, succeeding Cambyses I and preceding Cambyses II. He forged an empire which stretched from Central Asia and India in the east to the Mediterranean and Hellespont in the west. He also left a lasting legacy on Judaism as the ruler who ended the Israelites' Babylonian captivity, and it was said that God named him as a Messiah. By the time of his death, he had created the largest empire the world had ever seen.

Biography
Cyrus was born in 600 BC, the son of Cambyses I and Mandane of Media, and he became a sub-king in 559 BC (before his father's death), serving as a vassal of Media. In 553 BC, he led an uprising against his relative, the Median king Astyages, overthrowing him in 550 BC and inheriting his large empire. His marriage to Astyages' daughter Cassandane pacified Bactria, Parthia, and the Saka, and Cyrus went on to subdue Sogdia from 546 to 539 BC.

In 547 BC, Cyrus conquered Lydia in Asia Minor, defeating the wealthy Lydian king Croesus at the Battle of Thymbra in 546 BC. By 542 BC, all of Asia Minor had fallen under Persian rule. In 540 BC, he conquered Elam and its capital of Susa, and he defeated the Babylonians at Opis in 539 BC and conquered Babylon from Nabonidus. After taking Babylon, Cyrus proclaimed himself "King of Babylon, King of Sumer and Akkad, King of the Four Corners of the World", and he improved the lives of the Babylonians, repatriated displaced peoples such as the Israelites (for which he, "Koresh", was hailed as a Messiah by God and the Jews), and restored temples and cult sanctuaries. In December 530 BC, he died in battle with the Massagetae along the Syr Darya.